I couldn't believe the huge crowds of people praying outside of the bldg. There should be crowds of people like that in front of every city bldg. in the country demanding to bring our soldiers back from Iraq and put an end to their unnessesary deaths.......

Isn't commandment #5 about not erecting any idols? And doesn't all this praying around a hunk of rock seem a little suspicious? Isn't it just the words that matter? And the words you can carry with you anywhere? Wasn't it "In the beginning there was the Word."?

You guys are hilarious! And Marg, I completely agree. The clip I saw on CNN showed people yelling and looking obviously quite upset. They actually looked scary, and were screaming "bring back the 10 commandmants".

How would they feel if equal time was required to be given to ALL religions?? I'll ok the return of the monument when they allow the Charge of the Goddess or Homeric and Orphic Hymns to have a monument alongside.

1. Treat the Earth and all that dwell thereon with respect.
2. Show great respect for your fellow beings
3. Work together for the benefit of all mankind
4. Give assistance and kindness wherever needed
5. Look after the well being of mind and body
6. Remain close to the Great Spirit
7. Do what you know to be right
8. Dedicate a share of your efforts to the greater good
9. Be truthful and honest at all times
10.Take full responsibility for your actions

( No warnings against idol worship needed. Honor accorded to moms, dads, AND kids and all animals and all the earth. Much better! )

Even as this hunk of rock is being removed some woman in Texas is insisting that the statue of a sleeping panther in front of some government building in Fort Worth is actually a Pagan statue and should be removed.

Castillo said she would also not be bothered by a statue of a steer, because Fort Worth is nicknamed "Cowtown," but that a "cat-type animal brings more sinister symbolism."

The image of a sleeping panther has long been a part of Fort Worth history, beginning in the late 1800s, when a Dallas attorney, after a visit to Cowtown, reportedly claimed that "things were so quiet, he had seen a panther asleep on Main Street."

Such stories, whether true or false, later provoked city police officers to wear a patch of the dozing cat on their uniforms. And it was the reason a concert and dance hall off East Lancaster, now demolished, was renowned as much for its name _ Panther Hall _ as it was for the stars who performed there.

Now, if they could just get those people to keep taking their medication everything would be OK...

ROFLMAO!
It's either laugh or cry these days!

I just heard that the Governor of Mississippi has offered to put the statue in his state bldg. This issue is far from over as long as there are ignorant people, demogouges to lead them, & media to cover it all.

Um, I do agree...:LOL particularly since there are several mentions of the golden calf in the Bible and people getting into a lot of trouble over it. It is funny she would decide that it was the panther that is the "pagan symbol" and not the steer.

Isn't this whole thing INTERESTING?
I kinda feel like its a part of what I think is a disturbing trend. We seem to be moving away from diversity, and I cite the whole
"either you are with us, or against us" attitude toward war protesters as well as this situation as examples. Having that monument in a public building may embrace the judeo-christian popuation of our country (if you ignore the church and state separation for a sec, y'know, the most obvious argument for why the thing SHOULDN'T BE THERE!) but it is exclusive and alienating to all who aren't.
It also sends the message to folks in the court that they might not be judged according to the way our country has deemed they should be judged, but in the way the person who is doing the judging believes personally, their religious bias, if you will.
Y'know?
And yeah, I gotta figure that those folks prostrating themselves in front of the courthouse steps have A LOT of time on their hands to be hanging around wailing.
I predict you will see our fine judge in a higher safer position soon. I am sure that secretly GW thinks he's like the coolest guy EVER.
peace to all,
Cyn

There's a case about a 10 commandments monument in WI, too, and they have been arguing about it forever. It is still there, but a big fence was put up around it...to me it's not the actual monuments that are the bother, but the egocentric, or ethnocentric, or religiocentric (well, you know what I mean) attitudes that seem to so vociferously defend them--but only them--and refuse to achknowledge that another might be offended.

A guy was on local public radio declaring that the 10 commandments are the basis for law in the USA. Anyone know whether this is actually true? I have read that Jefferson also had in his posessiona Qur'an and I understand several of the men we refer to as "founding fathers" were Deists.

Not to argue about the validity of the 10 commandments--not my intention at all...but I agree that, without equal time, or equal acknowledgement of some sort, in taxpayer-owned spaces, they kind of go limp.

Disclaimer first: I AM NOT A JUDICIAL SCHOLAR. That said, I AM a lover of history and, though my life doesn't give me much time to do it these days, I read a lot of primary sources. For those who have never studied history, a "primary source" is stuff written at the time of events by people who were witnesses (or who claim to be, part of a historian's job is to figure out if the source is "reliable"). I have not looked at any of Jefferson's writings since high school. I have, however, recently started rereading David Hume, a Scottish philosopher of the 18th century. (This is pertinent, bear with me )

Now, jump to another subject: Not very long ago, what was USUALLY claimed as the basis for the US legal system was "english common law". This is the kind of law that exists in a place with a monarch (no, not a butterfly ) who is the 'ultimate court of appeal' and a fairly stable populace. Stable in caste and stable in location. This is stuff like, "I graze my sheep on the common because I've always done it, and my father before me and his father before him." And then the local earl (who owns, umm, let's say 10,000 acres upon which lay two villages and greens with sheep and a large market town) decides he was really in need of some new orchards and decides to plant them on the common. If the yeomanry are lucky and the monarch is travelling nearby and due to "hold court" (which CAN include a ball like in the sanitized fairy tales, but ORIGINALLY meant to sit in judgment), the people who are being evicted from their ancestral grazing rights can go to the King (or Queen) and beg for an audience and if they get it can present their case and MAYBE, if the earl has recently pissed off the King and if the King is aware how important a happy peasantry is (ranks of longbowmen in the next war, for example), the earl has to plant his orchards elsewhere. [An early attempt to make this more consistent was the Magna Carta, signed by King John, younger brother of Richard Lionheart at Runnymeade. Here is a translation found on the British Library site: http://vincent.bl.uk/cgi-bin/htm_hl?...er_first_match ]

NOW, notice, no one brought up what was done in another town at a different 'court'. There is no use of "precedent".

SO, here is where I always wondered why on earth we were supposedly so indebted to English Common Law:

Recently, probably since the Great Newt Revolt (or is the Greatly Revolting Newt ), I have heard this claim that our law is based on the 10 Commandments of the Judeo-Christian Tradition. (But, but, but, didn't Mel Brooks drop the other tablet and we REALLY had fifteen?ag --- never mind, scratch that )

I've got to say, this is the first I've heard of it.

Yes, it is true that the 10 Commandments are brought up as a great code of law. But, so are the Code of Hammurabi, the laws of the thanes among the Norse, Solon, Solomon, Draco (who we get the word "Draconian" from), Eshunna and the Roman Empire. IN FACT, SPQR was what I usually recall as being hailed as the source of our laws -- American Republic and Roman Republic? Get it? (Nudge, nudge ) Btw, SPQR stands for Senatus Populusque Romani -- the Senate and the People of Rome. (See http://iuscivile.com/ to get sources to read if you are interested.)

AND, an interesting thesis has been suggest to me by the book How the Scots Invented the Western World, which was loaned to me by a friend at work who insisted I read it. That is that much of our legal system grew out of the thinking of a number of Scottish Enlightenment philosopers (hence my reference to David Hume -- read about him in brief here: http://www.english.upenn.edu/~jlynch...ople/hume.html -- in the first paragraph) and the work of several judges in Edinburgh who were determined to make the legal system of Scotland (Yeah, yeah, I know they are part of the United Kingdom, but there is a long story behind that and, besides, lawyers who can practice in England STILL can't practice in Scotland because of their different legal system and bar.) follow the "Rule of Law" instead of the somewhat potentially arbitrary "English Common Law" as described above. (Of course, the English Law is NOW NOT arbitrary as they have a Constitutional Monarchy. Things have been written down and, I think, dragging "predecent" into the courts is allowed.)

If you have read this far, you will agree we need a wiping-the-brow smilie.

edited for grammer and spelling

and edited to add this link on the history of western jurispridence from the Catholic University of America: http://faculty.cua.edu/pennington/Law508/Law508.html If you check this out, you will note that there is no lecture titled "The 10 Commandments". I'm sure he brings it up some time; but, it doesn't seem to be a major issue.

I'd been meaning to post something about this for a while but never took the time and suspected no one would want to read it.

Glad I finally did. Might help me get my thoughts in order for when I have to argue this point to various people I know in person.

Now, I've GOT to knuckle down and get a report done on permeability and strength of soil on a bit of New York City that is soon to become a construction site. I really want this to be finished before I leave for the weekend.

Thanks, sohj--I've been listening to the radio as they discuss and discuss, and I was wondering about just where all that stuff we'd heard about the Magna Carta in school actually came in. Helpful, but still I'm not entirely clear on a lot of the claims involved.